Best GPU for Mining – A Buyer’s Guide in 2018

Cryptocurrencies are here to stay, and mining them is the hottest topic today. It is easy to understand the logic with the cryptocurrency prices hitting their all-time peaks in 2017. And, it is more profitable than ever to invest in cryptocurrency mining and earn coins today. While mining will give you money, getting started is not as easy as it sounds – you will need technical know-how to choose the best GPU for mining. Fortunately, I have put together a list of the top GPUs for mining alongside a guide to help you pick which one will meet your needs.

Top GPUs on the Market

This is a full HD GPU designed for the everyday miner. While its price may seem relatively high, consider that of the powerful RX 480 options, the machine performs optimally in different conditions. This card is one of the most power efficient from AMD options. It has the latest AAA graphics with a power draw of only 120W. The cards are designed to be compact in order to fit perfectly in mini-ITX and MicroATX PC designs. This produces less heat and less noise while working perfectly with other gadgets. AMD has not produced its version of the RX 470, and as such, you will see different cards on the market from different manufacturers.

Specs and Technology

The RX 470 uses Polaris 10, the same chip in RX 480. Its use of ‘binned’ Polaris 10 chips is a common practice in the world of microelectronics. The clock speed in this unit has been slightly reduced, placing the base speed at 426 MHz, which is way lower than that of the RX 480, which is at 1120 MHz. With a boost, the RX 470 can pre-overclock at 1270 MHz.

Polaris 10 is the most important aspect of this unit with the top advantage coming from improved power efficiency. AMD has also improved the hardware to offer better color compression, for efficient rendering, and better granular overclocking control especially with WattMan software from AMD.

Green – Each RX 470 comes with a dual fan build with about nine blades on each fan. The fans are made of plastic and rotate at high speeds to keep the unit cool at all times. There is a small switch on the sides that allow you to switch between overlocked mode and the power efficient mode. Each unit has 4GB GDDR5 memory with 32 compute units. This, coupled with 2,048 stream processors, allow you to mine more coins with ease. It is recommended for ether and zcash miners.

Pros

Offers full HD performance

Great power efficiency

Plenty of memory for its price

Cons

This was among the first graphic cards to hit the recommended specifications for HTC and Oculus Rift, making it a popular unit for gaming. With the advent of cryptocurrencies and mining, the performance of this GPU has really increased to offer the best. This is a full HD 1440P card, offering great performance in all mining conditions.

Specs and Technology

In terms of the physical design and performance, AMD has shifted from Graphics Core Next 3, or GCN 3, to GCN 4, or what they call Polaris. They have replaced the 28nm process with a 14nm process to allow more transistors without increasing power consumption. This means you get a better performing GPU while power use and heat remain low. This 14nm process is denser than 16nm process used in Nvidia’s GPUs, but this has not been shown to affect performance. This means tha, AMD has been successful in creating a powerful GPU to suit small budgets.

The RX 480 is a standard mid-range card with no fancy new technologies. It offers 36 compute units with 2.304 stream processors running at a clock speed of 1,120 MHz, which can be boosted up to 1,266 MHz. With all these, the unit draws 150W power.

This unit is capable of producing up to 5.8TFLOPs, Trillion Floating-Point Operations per Second, which places it among the best GPUs out there. However, TFLOPs have not been shown to influence performance in a great way.

Yellow – RX 480 has 8GB GDDR5 memory, but some cards are offered with 4GB. The 4GB models will offer about 7 gigabits per second while the 8GB offers 8 gigabits per second. This unit features asynchronous computing, which means you can assign different tasks to your GPU with different priority levels to be undertaken at the exact same time.

Each unit is offered with a single fan spinning to a good whirr while under load. The fan produces significant noise, though not the loudest in the market, but it offers great cooling. It is recommended thanks to its excellent performance.

Pros

Great performance

High speed and at a great price

Cons

This is one of the latest mid-range cards from AMD. It allows the latest graphics at full HD, allowing you to mine different coins. This comes as a minor update to the RX 480 from AMD with a clock speed above the average. If you did not fancy the RX 480, you can update your mining rig with the 580.

Specs and Technology

The RX 580 offers 1340MHz boost clock speed. When this is paired with 8GB or 4GB of GDDR5 memory, the unit allows you to mine ethereum with great efficiency. The 4GB version offers a lower speed compared to the 8GB version. Prices for these two are also different.

Green – The unit is offered with dual fans coupled with fan stop technology. This spins the fans down to a stop when your GPU is not under load to minimize power use. The customizable LED lights on the unit are great for gaming, but not needed while mining as they consume more power.

The highlight of the RX 580 is in its high clock speeds, which allow you to mine more. The unit is a genuine upgrade from the RX 480, offering better performance. It is recommended thanks to its high speeds.

Pros

Great HD performance

Easily customizable

Great price/quality ratio

Cons

The R9 Fury X is the latest release from AMD. The company has stayed silent for more than a year in which Nvidia has nearly taken over. This GPU sports the signature AMD architecture, but with every component being turbo-charged for speed, performance, and power efficiency. In this unit, AMD has moved from air cooling to water based cooling. This comes in handy for miners as the system stays online 24/7.

Specs and Technology

Though the R9 Fury X is more expensive compared to other AMD GPUs, it is still offered at a great price, looking at the competition.

Each unit uses a new GPU system referred to as Fiji, which is based on the Graphics Core Next that has been part of AMD graphic cards since 2011. While AMD has changed numbers in their systems, the structure and core design has not changed – a single Graphics Command Processor is used to delegate tasks to four shader engines.

The GPU has 16 compute units each with 64 stream processors offering up to 1,024 stream processors. Minor parts of the mining GPU are similar to most other GPUs from AMD. Shader engines are offered with their own texture unit with a rasterizer while the core continues building with 28nm process. This allows fast speeds in individual tasks while ensuring that power consumption remains low.

Green -This new chip is 596 square millimeters in size and carries 8.9 billion transistors to offer high speeds in all mining conditions. Clock speeds have been bettered in the Fury X up to 1,050MHz. The bandwidth figures of this unit give it precision performance. At 512 GB/sec, the Fury X is way over its competitors such as the GTX 980 Ti, which offers 336GB/sec. The familiar GDDR5 memory has been replaced with high-bandwidth memory, HBM, for better performance. With all the improvements seen on this unit, it is highly recommended for mining different coins.

Pros

Water based coolers keep the unit in mint condition

Fitted with high-performance memory

Cons

This card shows the progress that Nvidia has made in the past few years in its Pascal Graphics architecture. It is an efficient unit, acting as a full HD card and offered at a great price. It integrates swiftly into any system that needs a mining performance boost. While this unit might not wield the power of the latest GTX cards, its price-quality ratio is great.

Specs and Technology

You can use this unit in a PC with no graphic card at all as long as you have space in the case and there is a PCI-E slot on your motherboard. The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1050 Ti bases its design on the Pascal GPU design and it’s the first in the line of Nvidia GPUs. This allows the unit to support VR gameplay and enhances the speed of mining.

With this unit, you get 768 CUDA cores besides a 1760MHz base clock speed. The max boost clock goes up to 1392MHz. The system has a full 4GB GDDR5 memory and 128bit memory bus.

The 1050 Ti is built with a max thermal design power of 75W. This means there is no room for any additions, seeing that there is no PCI-E power connector that draws power from the system. You can maximize the graphics of your unit by mining different coins.

Yellow – This unit is viewed as a budget option for those who need to mine different coins. Its cooling system allows you to operate all year without downtimes. It is recommended thanks to its simplicity and performance in all mining conditions.

Pros

Great price-performance ratio

Handles all mining operations with ease

Low power consumption

Quiet operation

Cons

This is another budget option from Nvidia. It is a perfect competitor for AMD’s Radeon RX 480 in terms of features and price. This GPU is designed to offer enhanced performance to match its price. Since the original GTX 1060, Nvidia has released a less powerful model with 3GB memory. This 3GB model uses the same GP106 GPU as in the original model, which allows precision performance. While the 3GB has a relatively slow clock speed, it still performs well when mining.

Specs and Technology

This unit has been fitted with GP106 chip, which is new in the Nvidia lineup. Other units from Nvidia use GP104 chips. This chip is unique in that it does not take the ‘binned’ form as other chips, allowing it to offer a completely different performance. Like other GPUs from Nvidia, the GTX 1060 is powered by Pascal architecture, which gives it the benefits of 16nm manufacturing process. With this, the unit crams billions of transistors without increasing power consumption and heat production.

GTX 1060 has 1280 CUDA cores to perform the bulk of mining operations from the basics. This unit is designed for high boost clock speed at 1.7GHz. The unique chip design, coupled with the few CUDA cores let you mine efficiently.

The original version of this unit has 6GB of GDDR5 memory. While this is lower than other units, which have up to 8GB, it still allows full HD operation. The memory allows this unit to run at 8GB/sec.

Green – According to Nvidia, this unit draws 120W power, which is way lower than other GPUs on the market. If power consumption and heat are limiting factors, this unit can be your solution. The card looks great in its die-cast aluminum highlights with a black plastic shroud. The shroud houses the fan and the cooling kit to keep you in operation for long periods. You can use this unit in extra small desktops and in your living room PC and start mining immediately.

The unit is easy to connect, offering three display port connectors, DVI port, and HDMI 2.0b. This is a great unit for those who are looking to mine ethereum and zcash coins from their rooms.

Pros

Quiet operation with low heat production

Low power consumption

High boost clock speed

Cons

The Nvidia GeForce GTX 1070 is a flagship version of the GTX 1080. Granted, it is built from the Pascal architecture seen on GTX 1080 and other models from Nvidia. Pascal uses a shredded down manufacturing process, which reduces chip fabrication from 28nm to 16nm. This facilitates performance without increasing power consumption. This Pascal architecture allows the GPU to hold more transistors on a small piece of silicon, reducing power draw to 150W.

Specs and Technology

With Pascal architecture, the GTX 1070 holds 1920 cores – this allows the computer to do computational heavy lifting needed for mining Ethereum and other coins on the market. This is a commendable improvement from GTX 970, which crams 1664 cores, but still lower than the 1080, which has 2560 cores.

Pascal architecture also allows asynchronous computing. This enables your GPU to perform computations while still managing the graphics. Besides, the GPU chooses the tasks to prioritize. While asynchronous computing is not such a big deal in mining, it still makes the GPU perform faster in different mining conditions.

The GTX 1070 comes with a boosted speed of 1056 MHz, which is also a great improvement from the GTX 970. Unlike the GTX 1080, the 1070 does not have the new generation and fast RAM, the GDDR5X. It is instead limited to 2-card SLI configuration. It is offered with 8GB GDDR5 memory with a 256-bit bus. This offers 256 GB/sec of memory bandwidth.

Yellow – With the GTX 1070, Nvidia is only accepting 2-way SLI, but you can get an unlock code to add up to four cards on selected benchmarking applications. In a nutshell, the 1070 is like a minor version of the high speed 1080. This unit is recommended for those who are looking for a budget-friendly GPU to mine different coins. Once you have chosen the best GPU mining coin, setup is relatively easy.

Pros

Fantastic overclocking

Super quiet during operation

Power efficient

Cons

Since the release of the original GTX 1080, Nvidia has slashed the price of this model, making it more affordable while ensuring the performance remains on top. Nvidia rated this as one of the most powerful consumer-level graphic cards before they released the 1080 Ti. According to Nvidia, they spent millions to bring the new architecture alive and they had to ensure that the number match on paper matched the performance of the card.

Specs and Technology

This unit saw the introduction of Pascal architecture, which is the highlight of all that is good in this unit. Pascal, like in other units, applies a smaller manufacturing process of 16 nanometers. This means each piece of silicon will have a high number of transistors to enhance performance while reducing power consumption. Heat and noise are also reduced significantly.

For those of us who are interested in mining, Pascal allows a high number of CUDA cores – these are the elements that take the bulk of computational work. GTX 1080 has 2560 cores, which is way higher than most other Nvidia GPUs. This has also seen an increase in the clock speeds topping at 1607 MHz. All these features result from a slight increase in the power draw from 165W to 180W.

Besides the processing power of this GPU, Nvidia has replaced the GDDR5 memory with a faster GDDR5X. The latter works like the RAM in a PC, but faster, allowing you to mine more coins. With 8GB memory, the unit offers a memory clock of up to 10,000MHz. This means there is more capacity for miners, especially for those mining ethereum.

The unit is fitted with a single silent fan buried deep in the case. Connection can be done through DVI port, HDMI port, or DisplayPort. This GPU allows asynchronous computing, which means it can prioritize tasks and work on multiple tasks simultaneously – this offers you the much-needed speed. You can mine practically any coin you need on this unit. It is recommended thanks to its ease of use and its speed.

Pros

High speeds when mining

Easy connection with silent operation

Highly overlockable

Cons

The GTX 1080 Ti is one of the most expensive GPUs from Nvidia. It is the latest and the most improved graphic card of 2017, allowing users to mine fast and enjoy great returns from their investments. Nvidia designed this graphic card to compete with Titan X, a celebrated GPU for gamers and miners.

Specs and Technology

This is the seventh consumer graphic card to feature Pascal architecture with improved clock speeds and memory. While it shares some features with GTX 1080, it has a couple of unique features, making it an ideal choice for those interested in mining. These extra features allow the card to house 12 billion transistors with 3,854 CUDA cores. This translates to high speeds and better performance without affecting power consumption. It operates silently and with less heat.

The boost clock of this unit is rated at 1.6GHz overlockable up to 2.0GHz. With this unit, you get 11 GB GDDRX memory, offering clock speeds as high as 11GHz. The speed is up to 10 percent higher than the predecessor GTX 1080. Though the unit is designed to rival Titan X, it is 1 GB less – this is catered for in the high data speeds. Titan X offers 480GB/sec while GTX 1080 Ti offers 484GB/sec.

Green – The internal design of the system has been refined to offer a better power delivery and cooling system. Its blower fan design has been improved for better cooling and quietness. The unit is offered with an aluminum build that mirrors Titan X. The Founders Edition, from Nvidia, is slightly cheaper than third party cards. This unit is recommended for its high speed, ease of integration with different PCs and high memory. Looking at GPU mining comparison, this might pass as a GPU for all users.

Pros

High speed with low downtime

Integrates with different PCs

Highly overlockable

Cons

Power hog

High price

Comparison GPU for mining coins

GPU

Hashrate ZEC

Hashrate ETC/ETC

Power consumption

Efficiency ZCash (Sol/w)

Efficiency Ethash (MHS/W)

GTX 1080 Ti

620 Sol

35 MH/s

250 W

2.48

0.140

GTX 1080

475 Sol

28 MH/s

180 W

2.63

0.153

RX 580

280 Sol

26 MH/s

185 W

1.51

0.140

RX 570

260 Sol

25 MH/s

150 W

1.73

0.166

GTX 1070

435 Sol

27 MH/s

150 W

2.90

0.190

GTX 1060

282 Sol

20 MH/s

120 W

2.35

0/150

RX 480

300 Sol

29 MH/s

150 W

2.00

0.190

RX 470

250 Sol

24 MH/s

120 W

2.08

0.200

RX 460

110 Sol

11 MH/s

75 W

1.47

0.146

RX 560

120 Sol

12 MH/s

90 W

1.33

0.133

RX 550

70 Sol

10 MH/s

65 W

1.08

0.153

R7 370

150 Sol

—

190 W

0.78

?

R7 360

155 Sol

—

100 W

1.00

?

GTX 1050 Ti

155 Sol

13 MH/s

75 W

2.06

0.173

GTX 1050

135 Sol

—

60 W

2.25

?

Why Should You Mine?

When cryptocurrencies are mentioned, the first thing that comes to my mind and the mind of many is bitcoin, the top cryptocurrency on the market. While bitcoin is popular, it is not the only cryptocurrency on the market. There are more than 100 cryptocurrencies with numerous others born almost every day. However, some are copycats of Bitcoin with very low value and adding no tangible value to the market. Some cryptos have survived and are giving Bitcoin a run for its popularity. Ether is one of these cryptocurrencies which has had enormous growth in 2017, growing by over 2000 percent.

Why should you be interested in mining? Let us assume in January of 2017 you invested $1000 in cryptocurrencies, say bitcoin. By that time, the value of 1 BTC was $960. This would have gotten you 1.042 BTC. The value of bitcoin today, in December of 2017 is way past $10,000. $15,959.36 as of December 23, 2017, to be exact. This means that your investment of $1000 would have grown to $16,629.65 within a year, and if the prevailing trends are anything to go by, the value of BTC and other cryptocurrencies will continue rising.

The above example shows a situation where you buy cryptocurrencies and hold them. But, you can even have more coins if you decide to mine them. Here, you will only need to invest in a good GPU for mining and you continue earning coins every time your GPU authenticates a transaction. With mining, you only need to invest once in the GPU mining hardware and it will continue mining for you as long as you have power and memory.

Why are GPU used for Mining and not CPUs?

The answer is simple – speed. GPUs, or graphic processing units, have been designed to do video processing and do different tasks, including mathematical computations, with great ease under specified conditions. Video processing involves a wide load of repetitive work seeing that the system is being commanded to do the same thing to a wide host of pixels on the screen. Granted, GPUs are designed heavier with a higher ability to tackle repetitive work as compared with rapidly switching between tasks as a CPU does.

GPUs have large number of ALUs, Arithmetic Logic Units, and this gives them the ability to tackle bulk mathematical computations and in large quantities compared to CPUs. All this boils down to one thing: speed.

Mining and Mining Graphic Cards

I have mentioned cryptocurrency above, but never really got into explaining what it means. While some people may be familiar with the term, others might be new in this industry.

All cryptocurrencies are common in that they rely on a decentralized network to operate and to store all transaction information. This means that all transaction information is accessible publicly and not easy to corrupt. The network is referred to as blockchain, which is a string of blocks carrying transaction information. When a person initiates a transaction, it needs to be verified for authenticity and added to a block. Verification involves complex computations performed by miners.

Miners are computer systems designed for the sole purpose of verifying transactions. The miner goes through each transaction, solves algorithms efficiently, authenticates, and adds to the block. Miners are rewarded a small amount of the mined currency. To mine, you will need a lot of processing power. CPUs were used for mining, but with the advent of chips engineered specifically to mine, GPUs took over.

These mining chips are referred to as ASICs, which stands for Application-Specific Integrated Circuits. There are also FPGAs, which stands for Field-Programmable Gate Arrays. These chips or graphic cards are able to offer better mining performance, can mine quickly, and are able to keep up with the increased complexity of mining. This is how the mining business scaled from being a business of the masses to a business of those who are willing to invest in the best mining hardware. You can be among those who are mining the right way.

Ether, on the other hand, takes advantage of the processing power of GPU. This ensures that ASICs and GFPAs do not take over and you and I can continue mining from a GPU. If you are interested in mining ether, all you need are as many video cards as possible and to put them to work to mine as much ether for you as possible. Graphic cards are not about quantity, but quality; you need to get the right card for the job.

Features to Consider When Choosing GPU for Cryptocurrency Mining

There are numerous aspects to consider when choosing a GPU mining hardware. I suppose at this stage you have chosen the best cryptocurrency to mine with GPU, a cryptocurrency which will give you returns.

Hash Rate or Speed

One of the most important aspects to consider is the hash rate, also referred to as the hash power. Hash rate refers to the performance of a card in solving the algorithms that make up a block. The higher the hash rate, therefore, the faster the card mines and brings you coins as rewards. The hash performance of a card is measured in hashes per second, H/s. In most cases, the mega multiplier is used, meaning a card’s performance is indicated in mega-hashes per second, MH/s, which means millions of hashes every second. Giga hash and terra hash per second, GH/s and TH/s, are also used to refer to billions and trillions of hashes per second respectively.

Bus Width

The bus width determines the number of memory chips you can use on a card. Since the performance of a card will be affected by the memory, the higher the bus width, the better the performance. A GPU with 256-bit bus will allow a minimum of 8 memory chips with each memory chip having a 32-bit bus width. GPUs with double the memory will have 16 memory chips. These eight additional chips at the back of your card will share the bus with the eight chips at the front side of the card.

Think of bus width as traffic lanes – the more lanes, the better the flow of traffic. If 256 bit has four traffic lanes for example, 192 bit has three, and 128 bit has two.

Power Consumption

The right card will save your power and allow you to mine with great ease. Your miner will be running all day, and as such, running costs can get very high. This means you should skip features and fancy customizations that will increase power consumption. Nowadays, cards are designed to optimize power consumption. You can look at the reviews of a card before you buy just to make sure you have the best. Even then, seeing that mining cryptocurrencies such as ether relies on memory, choose cards with high quality memory chips for better results. This will allow you to mine more even when the power consumption is high.

Cooling

In a system that runs 24/7, you cannot cut corners when it comes to cooling. To get the best performance from your graphic cards, keep them running in mint condition. Most of the systems are offered with open frame design, allowing them to cool off the air around them. Others are designed with multiple fans for air circulation.

Overclocking

Overclocking means configuring your GPU to run at speeds faster than what the manufacturer specifies – this is one hidden ace that can give you a boost in performance. In mining, overclocking differs from normal computer usage conditions. In normal use, for instance when gaming, a graphic card will rarely get to full load, and as such, a more aggressive overlocking will be sustainable for short periods of time. Mining, on the other hand, keeps your card running at full power 24/7. In mining, excessive overlocking might not be sustainable.

The above are some of the technicalities to consider when choosing a card. You might, however, be wondering how the numbers will bring you earnings. You can manually calculate the profits you get from a machine, but that will be complex and can take a lot of time. Fortunately for you, most GPUs have mining power indicated on them – this shows the amount of coins, in BTC or ETH or any other currency that a machine can mine. There are also online tools that help you calculate earnings by entering your machine’s hash rate, electricity price, and power consumption. These online tools do the math to show you exactly how much you are going to make from your investment. If the return on investment is low, you might need more memory or a higher hash rate to increase it.

So, Which GPU Should You Pick?

Even with all the factors considered, the most important aspect is how your card behaves once it starts mining. You can choose the correct overlocking to increase a card’s performance by up to 40 percent from its original performance, but then, you will need additional device settings. Earnings in this case might be a little lower. Most mining rigs will allow four identical graphic cards. This offers you a stable system with less problems during mining, settings, and operation. Granted, you should choose a motherboard with at least four PCI slots as these are cheaper and more available.

Even better, you should choose rigs allowing six or eight graphic cards. Certain motherboards need a higher power supply and additional cooling. This means that the returns on your investment might be lower with all these expenses if the number of cards is low. The good thing is, the number of cards can be increased gradually as long as you choose the right motherboard with the right power supply. A high number of aspects are in play when choosing a good GPU, and these aspects will affect your earnings.

What to Mine

After you know the GPU mining meaning, the next question should be what to mine. Answering this question will play a role in the GPU you choose. GPUs are not created equal. Some are designed to mine specific algorithms and, hence, specific coins better than others. For instance, NVIDIA GPUs are good options when you are mining zcash while AMD GPUs come in handy when you are mining ethereum. Granted, it is important that you know what coin you need to mine before you source your GPU. Currently, most people are mining ethereum, but soon, ethereum mining might move from proof of work, which is referred to as mining, to proof of stake. When this happens, you might need to move to mining another algorithm.

The advantage of GPUs is that they can mine any algorithm, unlike ASICs, which are specified – but they mine some coins better than others. Given, switching from one coin to the next is not challenging, and I think coins in future might use the proof of work model.

Zcash and Ethereum are mined more than other cryptocurrencies on the market. There are mining pools and online platforms that allow miners to pool the hashing power of their GPUs and automatically move to the coin with the most profit. Once you have chosen a GPU to use, ensure that you keep up with the latest updates on that coin and what is trending in the mining arena – this will help you know when to switch lanes. You can check mining graphic cards comparisons for mining different coins to see the best for your needs.

There are different aspects to consider before you start mining. First off, you need to plan and see which coin you will be mining before looking at mining hardware comparison GPU. You need to choose a unit that is easy to integrate with your existing system. With an easy-to-setup GPU, you get started with great ease and this gets you returns within a short while. Though you can look at GPU mining comparison online, note that not all GPUs will mine a given coin efficiently, so choose wisely.

Comments:

SpinningAround

Here is the mining rig I’ve built. I consider it to be not only the tool that allows me to mine
cryptocurrency, but also a nice decoration of my wall))

Reply

Trdavidson

Hello, there. I don’t recommend anyone to hang the GPUs upside down, the way they’re in your case. To me it seems very likely that the electrons can fall out.

Reply

ManfredT

Looks kind of… I don’t know how to put it so that you don’t get offended. Really, man I don’t intend to offend you but… Are you sure that the power supply won’t fall down? Because if it does, all the rest will go down with it. I highly recommend you to take some measures in order to prevent the case.

Reply

Sanders

Well, I hope everything is working properly. Something tells me that the heat blowing from
the backplates is enough to burn a hole in your wall.

Reply

Locopeople

This is a real masterpiece. I think it is right the mining rig that belongs in a museum.

Reply

Cleverguy

Hi, I recommend you using a level so that to make sure that everything is straight. Besides, it’ll be great to hide all the wires. Actually, it’s not that hard to do it. You can buy all the necessary things online or create something yourself.

Reply

Bombstar

Hello, everyone! Is anyone looking for a great mining rig? I have one to offer. (Have a look at the picture provided) The rig can be yours for $3500 only. If anyone gets interested in it, please contact me – write a post here or send me a message)

Reply

TheEyeofTheTiger

Even though it looks kind of awful, I’d buy it if the price was lower.

Reply

UP and GO

I think the price is too high for such a mining rig. Unfortunately, it’s impossible to say how much the rig can cost due to the fact that we can’t see what GPUs are installed on it. Still, I believe it’s not the price the rig should have.

Reply

TrickyW

Looks like you’ve just finished building the rig and decided to sale it immediately. The rig doesn’t look nice at all. Personally I think that it’s not worth it to give $3500 for it.

Reply

InvisibleJoe

There is something wrong with the price for sure. Maybe you meant to say $350? If it’s so, I’ll buy it!

Reply

Steve

I’d love to not sleep at night with that running

Reply

Star

Hello, guys. I just wanted to share with you the pic of my mining rig. Been working on it for rather a long time. Hope you like it)

Reply

Newbiehere

Hello, there. I must say you did a great job! It looks just amazing! I wonder whether you bought everything for your rig in just one purchase or you were building it slowly, adding one GPU at a time?

Reply

Star

Hello, thanks. It’s very nice to know that someone out there likes my rig apart from myself) I really did my best in order to make it look the way it is now. I was building it slowly. I just couldn’t buy everything at once since the price to pay was rather high. I bought the first GPU for it on the first week of February. I continue adding GPUs on to my rig since then.

Reply

FreddieU

Hi, your rig is a real work of art I should say. Did you have to pay a lot for the GPUs installed?

Reply

Star

Hello, there. No, I should say the prices I paid were quite reasonable. Some GPUs were a bit more expensive or a bit cheaper (+/- $50).

Reply

AGuru

It looks very nice!

Reply

LeeSpeaking

Hi, could you tell me what frames you used? Thanks in advance for your answer and happy mining!

Reply

Star

Hi, there! Thanks a lot. This is the Veddha frame that you can see. You can easily find it on Amazon.

Reply

StenMoney

Hello, there. I’m interested in finding out more about the temperature conditions under which
EVGA hybrid cards keep on working properly. I’ve recently bought an EVGA card and I want to
know what temperature I’ll get on it if the room temperature is 95F. Thanks in advance for your answers.

Reply

HansenTY

Hi, I have 2 EVGA hybrid cards in my rig. I’ve are installed in a regular desktop, not on an
open-air frame. I usually get the temperature of 60-65 o C on them. As for the room temperature, it’s somewhere around 22 o C.

Reply

Sky56

I’ve an EVGA 1080Ti sitting on a regular desktop. The maximal temperature I get is 46 o C, the room temperature is approximately 19 o C. Please, mind that this is the temperature I get in case of a full load mining.

Reply

UltraWin

Hello. I also have 1080Ti Hybrid EVGA GPU. The temperature increases up to 48 o C on it meanwhile the room temperature is 21 o C. I believe the card to be great if not ideal for mining.

Reply

OnyxCC

I’ve managed to find one of the best GPUs that meets my needs. My rig is placed in the room where the temperature is approximately 80 o C. Despite the fact, the maximal temperature I get on it is around 45-50 o C.

Reply

HJ Scott

Hello, everyone. I’m writing this post with the view of finding out what you think about short
term mining. In particular, I’m interested in figuring out what coin is the best for the person who doesn’t plan to mine for a long period of time. I’ve been mining for almost a year now. Actually, I don’t think that mining “not popular” crypto currency or the coins that have recently been introduced to the market. I’ve tried mining such like currencies. All I can say is that the crux of the matter with such like coins is that you’d better not keep them for long. I did my best to mine as much as possible and then quickly convert the assets I earned into a more stable and popular coin (for example, BTC). If I had an opportunity to convert them to fiat currency, I took advantage of it. As a rule, I did it either every day or every week.

I know that every miner has his/her own strategy. However, since I’m not yet that much
experienced in the field, I’d really appreciate if any of you told me whether my strategy is right
or wrong. Should I really pay more attention to the coins that are more popular instead? The
main problem that I find difficult to get rid of is the fact that popular coins are more difficult to
find. So far, I’ve come to realize that the best way to succeed is to find a new coin, mine it for aslong as the difficulty is low and convert the assets you earn to more reliable coins every day. Can anyone recommend me a better way of earning crypto assets?

By the way, I use Crypto-CoinZ portal in order to get data about the newest coins that appear at the market. I also use WhatToMine portal for the same purpose. In case any of you say that I’m wrong, I’d really appreciate a piece of advice on what it is that I should do in order to mine the coins that has medium-level difficulty. Huge thanks to everyone!

Reply

AlexM

I believe that you should have a lot of hasharate if you really want to get profit when mining on a short-term basis. Remember that you also have to pay a charge for withdrawing the assets earned. So if you don’t earn that much every day, it’s simply not worth it.

I recommend you to stop using the Crypto-Coinz portal. I’ve used it a couple of times myself and I now realize that it’s totally useless.

Reply

HarryU

Hello, there. I think there is nothing wrong with the approach you use for mining. I think that the most important thing is the result you get. If you manage to get rid of the assets you have on time and earn a considerable sum of money, it’s great. I wasn’t that lucky. I’ve tried mining new coins several times and each time everything I got was my money wasted. The first time I failed to withdraw my assets and the second one I had problems with exchanging them because they were listed on a very strange exchange only.

Reply

FleetingMoment7

I think there is no miner that can say for sure whether you’re right or wrong. The thing is that every person gets to decide for himself/herself what fits him/her best. The only problem I find to be very serious in terms of mining new coins is that you have to be very quick to convert these new coins to more stable ones. In other words, in case you happen to have lots of new coins you may either make a big sum of money on them or you may fail to react on time and lose all the money you invested. Is your potential profit worth the risk you take?

Reply

OpaI

I’ve recently noticed that the temperature on one of my mining rigs is considerably lower than I expected. There are 4 GPUs installed in my rig: a 1070Ti GPU, two 1080 GPUs and one 1080Ti GPU. The rig itself is running on Windows 10.

I checked this mining rig several times a day and all I could see was that the hashrate and the earning rate were good. Due to the fact that I have several rigs I’m unable to monitor the way this particular rig works all the time. I suppose that this has a negative effect on the total sum I earn. Could anyone tell me what I need to do in order to resolve the problem? The first time the problem occurred with my NVIDIA GPU. Now, the same situation is happening with the miner on which lyra2z is installed. Thanks for any of your answers and recommendations.

Reply

Kfgenius

Hello, there. I don’t think there is something wrong with your lyra2x. I think it usually takes half of the wattage only.

Reply

KevinGTLK

It’s fine for lyra2z to use less power. I’ve carried out my own investigation into the matter and, based on the results I received, I can confirm that it’s fine. The thing that I notice very often is that the hashrate reported by my CCMiner software is lower than the one reported by the pools I use.

Reply

CryptoWorld67

Hi, I’d say that there is nothing wrong. I have a mining rig with a 1070Ti GRU on it. Sometimes I use it in order to mine ETH and Equihash. I’ve found out that when I’m mining ETH less watts are used than when I mine Equihash.

Reply

DavidF

I’ll truly appreciate if there is someone who can help me to resolve my problem. I’ve recently misplaced my USB with all my stock ROMs and stuff. So the thing I need to do now is to get the stock bios for the cards that you can see below. (For some reason, I’m unable to create annorak account. I don’t know what the matter is)

Could anyone tell me which one is the best for me to use and why. Huge thanks in advance. I’m looking for a motherboard on which I’ll be able to install 12 GPUs. Of course, I’d like it to work properly and without crashes. I want to hear your opinion on the cards I mentioned (maybe, you’ve used them). I’ m willing to spend as much money as necessary in order to have a perfect mining rig.

I’ve already used ASUS Prime Z270-A. So far everything is fine and I really like it. However, I want to have a motherboard that has more PCIE slots. (For this reason, I’m interested in a brand new GIGABYTE GA-B250 from Fintech)

Reply

SimonTRC

I’ve used ASRock BTC+ motherboard. They seemed to be great up until they all died. I don’t know what exactly was wrong with them, but the thing was that they didn’t work for long. I’m currently using a Biostar GPU (bought it for $120 only). It’s amazing and has 12 PCIE slots so I can install all of my cards on it.

Reply

GrandPa

I’ve used different motherboards including the ones you’ve mentioned in your post. Based on
what I noticed when using these 4 motherboards, I can say the following (it’s my opinion only
and I don’t mean to say that it’s absolutely right):

ASUS Prime Z270-A – has 7 PCIE slots only. Therefore, if you want to have a
motherboard with 12 PCIE slots, you’ll have to get a PCIE splitter. I believe the splitter
can sometimes be the thing that causes instability in the work of a mining rig (this
depends on the OS you use).

ASRock H110 motherboard – The PCIE slots seem to be too close to each other. I also
had to take some measures in order to make sure that there is enough space between one
of the slots and my USB adaptor.

B250 motherboard from ASUS – I had too many problems with this one. I’ll never use it
again.

I’ve not tried the last motherboard from the list yet (GIGABYTE from FinTech). I’ve already bought it online and I’m now waiting for it. I should say I really like the motherboards that are designed so that they have 12 PCIE slots. I believe the mining rigs built on such like motherboards are more stable and easier to work with.

Hello, there. I’m currently busy with moving the mining rigs I have into a prebuilt shed. They’ve become too big to be kept at home. It’s expected that we’ll have a very hot summer in the place where I live (the temperature is expected to increase up to 100F and the humidity will be 90-100%). I’ve built my mining rigs with the help of some of my friends (we keep on mining together). They say that the best way to make the air circulate will be to use a push pull method. I have serious doubts about that. I don’t think it’ll be enough to prevent the rigs from overheating.

We’ve decided to put our rigs into a “8×12” shed that already has ventilation pre-installed. Of
course, we’re going to improve it since it’s not enough. I think that it’ll be enough to add 2 vents and 2 fans on either end of the mining rigs so that to cool them down during summertime. What do you think? Will it be enough? My friends also think it’ll be great to add a window unit. We have 4 rigs. Each of the rigs has 6 GPUs installed on it. We want to create more rigs later on. I’ll really be grateful for all the opinions you’ll share with me))

Reply

HyperM

Hello. I think you’ll be fine with fans. As for the AC, I don’t think they’re necessary. You’ll have to pay money for them meanwhile they won’t do much.

Reply

RupertIam

If I were you, I’d add two units. I recommend you setting them up in the place where AC’s blow into the back of your cards. The idea is that they’ll intake cold air.

Reply

KlaPi

Hello, there. I don’t understand why you need to cool your cards down. The fact is that the majority of the cards designed and used for mining purposes work properly even when the temperature increases up to 70 o C. The only thing that’s necessary to do is to take care of the heat that gets accumulated around your heatsinks. Here is the thing I found out thanks to the many years of experience in mining – there is no need to add cool air to a mining rig. The only thing to do is to take necessary measures in order to get rid of the hot air that comes from it.

I live in a place where it’s okay to have the temperature of around 100-105F during summer. This is also the season of a year when we have to deal with 70% air humidity. Believe me I know what I’m talking about. If you’re concerned about humidity, don’t be. You see the GPUs you have in your rigs will serve as a kind of barrier that won’t allow moisture to get in. If you’re going to place your rigs in a shed, check that it’s roof is waterproof. This way your rigs will be protected in case it starts raining heavily.

Reply

SuperMiner

Hi, everyone. Have any of you noticed that the temperature of a mining rig placed under a tent with a couple of fans differs from the temperature of an open-air rig? I’ve noticed that the temperature is lower in the rig that I keep in the shed that was specially built for it.

Reply

ThomasFan

I get higher temperature. I don’t worry about it much because it’s usually rather cool in my room where I keep my rig.

Reply

PeterNorth

I’ve created a special box (case) for my rig. There is a fan on top of it that serves as an exhaust
fan. Due to the fact that the intake is on the side, air is forced to pass through the cards and come through the exhaust fan on top in order to get out. I see that the temperature of the rig is now considerably lower than when it was placed in the open air.

Reply

IanAlex

I’ve placed my mining rig (with 6 GPUs installed on it) under a grow tent recently. The intake is on the bottom and the exhaust fan is placed on top right. As a rule, I get the temperatures of 58-65F (depends on the position of the cards). Actually, this temperature isn’t that much different from the temperature I got when the rig was placed in open air (I kept it in my room). However, I can see why it’s better to keep a rig covered. The tent prevents the dust from getting in my rig and also I’m now able to direct the heat that gets accumulated inside it.

Reply

GFellow

Hello, there. I wonder if anyone is having the same problem as me. What I’m talking about is that it doesn’t mine Equihash in case I decide to automine it. I have 2 GPUs in my rig (1060 3GB and 1080). I’ve been unable to mine Equihash with them for three days already. Does anyone know the reason for it? What am I to do now? Thanks for your answers)

Reply

HarryTI

Hello. I think you need to check that your Nicehash client shows an accurate hashrate of Equihash. If the client shows a lower rate than it really is, the client will have problems with identifying the most profitable coin to mine in your case. In your case, it’ll stop mining Equihash.